BACK TO STORYBROOKE – A RUMBELLE FANFIC
by marivon
Summary: 2 week hiatus? No way! My take on how the homecoming to Storybrooke might happen. Warning: will be quite Rumbelle-centric, as Rumple is the most complex and intriguing character of the show in my view and I like to see his softer and tortured side which comes out with Belle!
1. Chapter 1

**A 2 week hiatus? No way! My take on how the homecoming to Storybrooke might happen. Warning: will be quite Rumbelle-centric, as Rumple is the most complex and intriguing character of the show in my view and I like to see his softer and tortured side which comes out with Belle!**

Belle awoke with a start. She had had the same wretched dream again: Grumpy had stormed into the library to tell her that the _Jolly Roger_ was approaching and she had run down to the harbour with him. Completely out of breath, she had watched as they all descended the plank, one after the other: Regina, Emma, Henry, Snow and Charming, and then Hook… but not her Rumple. She didn't need to ask what had happened to him: the prophecy had come true and the love of her life had died while saving his grandson.

As Belle forced herself to breathe regularly, the vivid dream slowly made room for a more pleasant memory: Ariel had come back from Neverland the day before and had brought with her a message from her Rumple! "He asked me to tell you that he loves you and that you were right: you're going to see him again." Ariel had had tears in her eyes as she conveyed his message, and Belle had given her a long hug while sobbing into her newfound friend's shoulder.

Kicking off the covers, Belle smiled to herself: he was going to come back to her! For about a week she had struggled with the thought that he might have been right, that they would never see each other again, and for a week she had wondered every day whether he actually was still alive. Now she knew that he was and that he had Pandora's box to trap Peter Pan in. He wouldn't have to face Pan in a mortal duel and he would be back with her soon, safe and sound.

Belle went downstairs into Rumple's big kitchen (she had moved back in the day he left for Neverland, desperately wanting to be surrounded by his things) and made herself coffee before tucking into a big bowl of cereal. She had hardly eaten the last week, her concern over Rumple taking away her appetite and her sleep. But now there was hope, and she was actually hungry for the first time since he had left.

After breakfast and a shower, she would go and pick up Ariel from Granny's and they would try and find Prince Eric. Regina hadn't told Ariel where exactly to find him but Belle was sure that it wouldn't take them very long to find someone who knew him.

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In the early afternoon, after successfully reuniting Ariel and Eric who had wandered off for a long overdue talk and probably much more, Belle returned to the library for the first time since she had lost her memory on the town line. Belle snorted sarcastically as she tried imagining her _alter ego_ Lacey engrossed in a book that was not a guide to the finest (or cheapest?) whiskies of the world.

It had been truly cruel of Regina to give her Storybrooke identity a personality that was the exact opposite of her own and one that could bring the worst out in Rumple rather than the best. She shuddered as she remembered Lacey's behaviour during their date at Granny's and how Lacey had pushed Gold to let out and show off his dark side. They would have to talk about their time together when she hadn't been herself at some stage, why he had been so keen on spending time with someone who only looked like her and hadn't tried to make things up to his son instead. His son!

How was Rumple going to deal with Bae's death once he was back and had time to properly grieve him? He had been completely heartbroken when he had woken her up with the blue fairy's potion but only hours later he had embarked on the mission to save Henry. Knowing her Rumple, he would keep it together as long as he had a purpose but once he was back in Storybrooke and Henry was safe, he would no longer be able to escape the pain. But she would be there for him; and together they would get through it!

Belle shook her head, trying to stop herself from obsessively thinking about Rumple and what to expect when he came back. "Focus on the library, on getting this place finally opened to the public," she told herself and started clearing a huge pile of books sitting on her desk.

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Shortly after 4pm, Belle heard a thump on the library door and then Grumpy's frantic voice: "Belle, are you in there? Belle, quick! Come quickly!" She dropped the books in her hand on the floor and rushed to the door, her hands shaking as she turned the keys. This was far too close to the recurring dream she had had the past week. She gulped and opened the door to find Grumpy pointing at a greenish portal opening in the middle of the road just outside the library. More and more people were gathering around but nobody was keen to get too close to the vortex.

"Do you think it's them?" Grumpy asked Belle who had instinctively taken his hand.

"I hope so," she said. "Where is the Blue Fairy? We might need some magic in case it's someone else… but then I don't know who but Rumple and Regina could break their way into a place that is protected by a cloaking spell… Rumple must have left a loophole in the spell for them to get back in. Well, perhaps I can think of one other person who seems very powerful perhaps but I hope it's not him… Pan…" Belle realized that she was rambling and that her ramble was not reassuring Grumpy.

"How long does it take for this bloody portal to stabilize and get people through? I mean it can't be lo- " Grumpy said when suddenly several, about half a dozen shapes, appeared out of the vortex and within seconds, it closed leaving behind some greenish fog that took far too long to clear for Grumpy and Belle's liking.

The fog cleared slowly and as the group came into view, Belle finally saw who had come through the portal: first, she could see David and Mary Margaret, still immobile in an embrace. To their right she recognized Emma, Hook and Regina. All three of them had their eyes fixed on someone who was holding a smaller person in his arms. Belle's heart rate increased: it had to be Rumple holding Henry! She was about to run towards him when the last bit of greenish smoke vanished. The man standing there was not Rumple at all… it was Bae! Bae was alive! But Henry in his arms looked lifeless.

The bystanders all seemed as shocked as Belle and Grumpy. Nobody said a word for what felt like an eternity.

Belle felt like she was about to faint. Shaking, she made her way over to the group. "What happened?" she asked, her voice a mere whisper, looking into the distraught faces of Mary Margaret, Emma, David, Hook and Neal. Even Regina seemed to be in a lot of emotional pain. But when she spoke, her voice was as icy as Belle remembered it:

"Pan. He took Henry's heart, and he trapped Rumplestiltskin in Pandora's box. There's no way of releasing him without releasing all the other evil trapped in there. It's all over."

"No, it isn't!" Neal interjected, and the determination and vehemence in his voice reminded Belle of his father. He knelt down and gently laid Henry on the ground. Within seconds, Emma was on her knees as well, cradling Henry's head in her lap. Belle could see that Henry was in some sort of magical stasis but the magic was flickering and she knew that it would not be long before the stasis wore off and Henry would be gone for good.

"Belle, I secretly managed to release Papa from Pandora's box when we were on the _Jolly Roger_ and he has gone back to Neverland to retrieve his dagger and get Henry's heart back. We have to believe that he'll succeed. He simply has to."

Belle nodded her head, her voice completely failing her. Rumple in Pandora's box, trapped with God knows what evil. He must be frightened out of his mind. All the optimism of the previous 24 hours simply washed away. Bae quickly stepped towards her when he realized that she was extremely shaky on her legs and put a comforting arm around her.

"What do you mean, you released him from the box?" Regina was at Neal's and Belle's side in a second and stared daggers into both of them. "You can't release anything from the box without letting other evil escape at the same time! You fool!"

"That's not true," Belle said, her voice shaky at first but getting firmer as she went on. "I read that if a blood bond exists between the person trapped and the person wanting to free the person in the box, then it is possible." Regina stared at her blankly. "I might not be a practitioner of magic but I have acquired a lot of knowledge over the years. And I had plenty of time to go over information I had read before in all the years you had me locked up!"

Regina grimaced but decided not to answer. Neal cut in:

"I wasn't sure whether it would work, whether I could get out only him and not other evil stuff but I knew we needed to take a risk, for Henry, and for David. Papa is the only one who can help heal David, the only one who can get Henry's heart back… And besides, I wasn't quite ready to lose him for good, now that it looks like he has truly started to change. Besides, what is done is done. All we can do now is wait!"

"What do you mean, heal David?" Belle asked, her eyes suddenly moving over to study David who seemed paler than usual and kept sipping water from a satchel. Neal didn't have time to explain what had happened to David because the ground started shaking and another portal started opening. Belle's heart jumped in her chest and while the vortex slowly expanded, she kept repeating the same mantra in her head: "Please let it be him! Please let it be him! Please let it be him! Please let it be him!"

Two people emerged from the vortex and, as before, the portal closed leaving behind a thick greenish fog.

Belle was finally able to release the breath that had been hitched for what seemed an eternity when she heard Rumple's voice through the slowly dissipating fog: "Now, if you know what's good for you, you won't move!" He sounded extremely angry but there was a note of sadness and weariness in his voice, too.

As the fog cleared, she finally caught a glimpse of Rumple. He was holding a young man – Peter Pan—in what seemed a forced embrace with one arm while his other arm was held further up in the air. Belle could clearly see the Dark One's dagger in the raised hand. So he had found his dagger and Peter Pan. But why had he brought the dangerous, manipulative Pan to Storybrooke rather than getting Henry's heart and leaving Pan behind in Neverland?


	2. Chapter 2

Pan was the first to speak. His icy voice sent shivers down Belle's spine. "Go on, son, kill me if you have the guts to do it. Show them, all of them, that you are not a coward like your old man!"

"I am nothing like my father," Rumple said through clenched teeth as he forced the smug teenager onto the ground, the dagger about to dig into Pan's throat. "I just brought you here because I didn't want to risk Henry's heart cooling down too much on the way back. I don't care what happens to you once I do this…" he hissed as he raised his left hand before shoving it into Pan's chest. Pan gasped and twisted as Rumple tore Henry's heart out of his chest.

"Regina, take it! Put it back where it belongs," Rumple said, holding the beating heart in his hand but still staring at the writhing Pan on the ground. Belle could not make out the conflicting emotions spread over her loved one's face. What was going on? He seemed to be torn, in pain but still incredibly angry at the same time.

Regina was at his side in a split second, grabbed Henry's heart and within seconds, Neal had left Belle's side to kneel down next to his son so that he would be able to see all three of them when he was brought back to life.

Regina looked up to Emma who gave her the slightest of nods. Regina then removed the magical stasis with a flick of her left hand and plunged the heart into Henry's chest. Everyone who could see the scene gasped in a mix of horror and relief and even Belle's attention had been drawn away from her Rumple towards Henry. Regina withdrew her hand a few seconds later, just in time for Henry to draw a deep breath and open his eyes. He was clearly confused but as he saw his two mothers and his father, a smile appeared on his face. Then, as he seemed to remember what had happened in the skull cave, his smile disappeared and his hand shot up to his chest. He sat up so suddenly that he knocked over Regina. He jumped onto his feet and, turning around himself once, took in his surroundings. Within seconds, his parents and grandparents were fighting over who could get closer to him and hug him more tightly and everyone around suddenly seemed to be awakening from their trance and started talking at the same time, voicing their wonder and their relief.

As soon as she realized that Henry was going to be fine, Belle focused on Rumple once again. He was still pinning Pan down but the latter –very pale and looking frail—had now stopped squirming. Despite his apparent weakness he was still able to speak to Rumple although with everyone suddenly talking wildly among themselves now that Henry was back on his feet again Belle could not hear what he was saying. But she knew from Rumple's expression that whatever Pan was saying was hurting him deeply. All the anger had gone from his face; there was nothing left but pain and hurt. What sort of hold did the smug teenager have over him? She couldn't make sense of it.

As she finally made her way over to Rumple and quickly sank to her knees next to him, he looked up at her for the first time since he had reappeared through the portal. Only then did it strike Belle that he hadn't searched for her in the crowd before. Another oddity. "Belle," he managed to say in a monotonous voice and with an utterly lost look on his face as if only now realizing that by coming back through the portal he was finally reunited with her.

All she wanted to do was take him into her arms but his gaze had already dropped down to Pan again, his facial expression unchanged. Besides, he was still holding his dagger to Pan's throat and seemed undecided as to whether let Pan get up or take his life right there and then. So Belle decided to squeeze his arm ever so slightly and in a whisper she asked: "Rumple, are you alright? What do you want to do with him now?"

"Yeah, Rumple, are you alright? And what do you want to do with me now?" Pan said mockingly. As Rumple would not look at her, Belle turned to look the mocking teenager in the face wondering where the blatant hatred in his voice could possibly come from. It was then that she saw something strange happening to his face. For a split second or so, the teenager's facial features disappeared to give way to a much older face, the face of a bearded man in his forties.

"Why is he changing, Rumple?" she asked in a trembling voice.

"The magic that gave him youth is running out. That's what he needed Henry's heart for, to keep him young. And now he is turning back into the person he was before, before he turned into Peter Pan." Rumble said quietly, still not meeting her gaze.

Belle strengthened her grip on his arm, instinctively feeling that there was something that he was not telling her, something very important. And Pan's words only confirmed her gut feeling.

"Now, Rumple, are you not going to tell your lovely Belle who I was before I turned into Pan? She deserves to know… hell, they should all know! Another one of your secrets. But then, why am I surprised – you're still too scared she will run from you, abandon you… because when has anyone really loved you enough to stick around, right?"

At this, Rumple pressed the dagger even closer to Pan's throat and Belle could see a trickle of blood running down his throat. Was Rumple really going to kill Pan? But all of a sudden, he lifted the dagger from Pan's throat and shoved it into Belle's hand. She jumped at this sudden movement, and incredulously stared at the blade in her right hand. He had given it to her, entrusted her with this magical object that held his power.

Neal must have been watching the scene for a short while, too. He suddenly appeared at their side and knelt down on Rumple's other side, clearly as worried as Belle at his father's facial expressions. "Papa? Are you OK?"

A sad smile appeared on Rumple's face. "Not really, Bae, no. But I will be. Help me get him to my shop, please? We should make sure he's safely tucked away before I start on that potion for Charming. He can't have a lot of time left." As Neal grabbed Pan (who appeared to be too weak to put up a fight anyway), Rumple finally turned to face Belle.

His eyes instantly filled with tears and love as he saw the worried expression on her face. "Belle, I'm sorry to have caused you so much worry. Will you come with us? I really need you to be close to me now. And once I've taken care of Charming's potion, I'll have time to explain. I will explain, I promise." She nodded and closed her eyes in anticipation as he moved in to press a brief but passionate kiss on her lips.

Neal had pulled Pan to his feet and Belle helped Rumple get up after having shoved the dagger into her coat pocket. As he didn't have his cane, he had to hold on to Belle as they started walking towards his shop. They didn't get very far before hearing Henry's voice calling after them: "Grandpa, wait!"

Within seconds, Henry had overtaken them and, hugging Rumple, he started thanking him profusely: "Thank you, Grandpa. Thanks for saving me. I'm sorry I caused so much hassle for everyone. I should never have believed in him," pointing his finger in the direction of Pan who rather than walking by himself was being dragged along by Neal, "I should have believed in all of you, my family."

Belle could see that Rumple was clearly moved by his grandson's sudden outburst of emotion and his thankfulness. He ruffled the boy's hair and said: "You're welcome, Henry! Now, run along. I have to make sure that you still have two grandfathers tonight."

Henry shot him a quizzical look – so Belle was not the only one who didn't yet know what had happened to Charming – but he knew his paternal grandfather well enough to know when not to ask questions. He ran back to Emma to ask her what was going on with Charming.

"What's wrong with Charming?" Belle asked Rumple, as they continued towards his shop.

"Poisoned by dream shade," he said.

"But there is no cure," Belle answered, alarmed.

"Yes, there is. I found one. After Hook poisoned me and I nearly died from it, I studied the poison in more detail and I have developed an antidote."

Belle stopped in her tracks. "Hook poisoned you with dream shade? When? … Hold on, when I was in hospital and couldn't remember you. That phone call…" Her voice failed her as she saw a mental picture of her Rumple in agony and she deepened her hold on him as they approached his door.

"Oh, darling Belle, I'm sorry. There is so much we need to talk about. And we will. But now there's more urgent matters I need to deal with. I trust you have the key to my shop?" He finally gave her a smile, but it didn't quite reach his eyes.

Belle smiled a reassuring smile back at him as she turned the key. Rumple was right, they had to help Charming and to deal with Pan. They also needed to talk. They could do all of that now that they were reunited. She had her Rumple back. So why was she still so worried? As she turned around to grab his arm once again to help him walk into the shop, she shuddered: she did not like the dark shadow of pain and sorrow that had crept onto his face in the few seconds that she had let go of him. He was clearly putting on a brave face for her, for Bae, for Henry, for everyone. But something was wrong, very, very wrong.


End file.
